One open secret
of elections is that people very often aren’t voting for a candidate but
against another candidate. They aren’t putting someone in office, but keeping
someone else out.
Another open
secret of elections is that people often vote out of insecurity and fear- fears
for their incomes, jobs, savings, for their children’s futures, that they’ll be
worse off under another candidate’s regime…
Finally,
there’s the open secret that the fear many people vote from are unfounded or
irrational- that the government is plotting to make your religion illegal,
allowing immigrants to ‘pour’ into the country, will make owning a gun illegal,
founded and funds foreign terrorist groups…
What makes
fear so destructive to democracy and social stability is that it’s by its very
nature irrational. Unlike someone exercising caution, sober-mindedness, risk
assessment, and carefulness, a fearful person is usually uninformed (working
without good information) and/or selfish (obsessed with their own safety or
desires without attention to others’).
Fear often
leads to overreaction- impulsive, knee-jerk action- or, conversely, paralysis-
the inability to make good decisions or implement important activity.
Out of fear
that our children might take drugs, we’ve ended up creating a multi-billion dollar
prison infrastructure and incarcerating millions of nonviolent offenders as
part of our ‘war on drugs’;
Out of fear
of ‘terrorism’, we’ve severely curtailed the civil liberties of millions,
illegally ‘profiled’ certain ethnic groups, cultures, and religions, and waged
undeclared war on huge swathes of the globe, raining entire regions with drone
strikes and bombing campaigns;
Out of fear
for personal safety (and property values), we’ve militarized our police forces,
criminalized the homeless, and reinforced structural racism in our courts,
prison systems, and grand juries.
Much
reporting and analysis during this election has focused on the fears of many Americans, and one group of Americans has stood out- Christians.
This election has been in the thrall of fearful Christians. A quick google search yielded me a whole page of headlines about fearful Christians-
Christians who fear the loss of their guns;
who fear Christianity is slowly becoming illegal;
who fear the presence of Muslims and other faiths openly expressing themselves in their towns;
who fear that LGBT people are destroying America;
who fear Common Core curricula is poisoning their children...
The tragedy
for me, as a theologian, is that this shows the extent to which so much
American Christianity- of every denomination- is disconnected with theological
reflection and the biblical text.
The
biblical text is rife with exhortations to have no fear of anything. The
righteous are not to worry or be anxious. The Hebrew book of Proverbs, the
Psalms- and for certain denominations, the Book of Sirach and the Wisdom of
Solomon- in dozens of instances all stress clear-thinking, wisdom, and sober-mindedness.
For
Christians, Jesus on numerous occasions told his disciples not to fear what was
going on, as well as to love their enemies, not fear them.
It is vital
to remember, however, that we are not to be indifferent, nor are we to think
that nothing really matters, that all situations are equal, or that we are not
to care what happens.
Rather, whatever is going on around us, we
are to actively pursue, as Jesus did, the Kingdom of God- peace, justice, and
kindness;
We are to
declare, as Jesus did, the year of God’s favour, not his wrath and his
judgement;
We are to
declare and live out, as Jesus did, the Good News of the Gospel- food for the
poor, sight to the blind, release to the prisoners, freedom for the captives,
life for the lifeless, a voice for the voiceless;
But what if, many argue, we feel legislated against? What if
they legalize what we hold to be sin? What if they allow what we see as
disgusting? What about creating godly
courts and governments?
St. Paul, writing to Christians who were
often socially disadvantaged, looked down upon, or legislated against, never
told his readers to be fearful of the future or strike back out of fear:
the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Against such things there is no law (Gal. 5:22-23).
Whatever happens, love one another; do what is right; live
peaceably with your neighbours; keep your head. There’s no law against that…
When was the last time in this election season you heard a Christian priest, pastor,
or politician say that?
What if, many argue, the situation is serious, even grave?
What if we’re attacked? What if cataclysm falls upon us? What if the Antichrist
appears? What if our enemies destroy what we hold sacred?
As he was sitting on the Mount of Olives, his
disciples came to him privately and said, “Tell us, when will these things
happen? And what will be the sign of your coming and of the end of the age?” Jesus
answered them, “Watch out that no one misleads you. For
many will come in my name, saying, ‘I am the Christ,’ and they will mislead
many. You will hear of wars and rumors of wars.
Make sure that you are not alarmed, for this must happen, but the end is still
to come. For nation will rise up in arms against
nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be famines and earthquakes
in various places. All these things are the
beginning of birth pains… So when you see the abomination of desolation—spoken about by Daniel the
prophet—standing in the holy place (let the reader understand), then those
in Judea must flee to the mountains (Matt. 24:1-8,15-16).
Armies will march; persecution will come; God’s Temple will
be destroyed… But make sure you are not alarmed; this isn’t
the end of the world; God has not abandoned us… No need to fight; no need to
form a resistance; just run, run away, save yourself, save your family; love God and your neighbour...
When was the last time in this election season you heard a Christian priest, pastor, or
politician say that?
Socially, fear- and fearmongering- never nurtures democracy.
It never builds social capital. It is never the foundation stone of beneficial
public policy.
Theologically, fear- and fearmongering- is never described
as a good or healthy spiritual trait. It is warned against in hundreds of passages
in the biblical text. It is antithetical to the person and message of Jesus as
he is described in the Gospels.
It is because of fear, scare tactics, and lowest-common-denominator
fearmongering that we stand on a social and democratic precipice- and the fear
of many Christians has played no small part in bringing us to this point.
Those
Christian leaders, clergy, the Christian politicians they prop up, and the ordinary Christians posting to Facebook and Twitter who have
sown so much fear into the hearts and minds of their congregations, constituencies, and friends have done them, the country as a whole, and American democracy an enormous disservice.
For that, we must all repent…
… And model something very different.
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